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This was my fifth trip and my first week long. We started out at the Boulder Mail Trail in the early evening. Backpacking across the slick rock terrain towards Death Hollow. The first hike was a challenging one with multiple river crossings (hopping from stone to stone) and steep descents on the slick rock into Death Hollow. We made it to our riverside cove campsite late in the evening and set up our tents in preparation for rain. Luckily it was still dry when we woke up, so we packed up and had group meditation before setting off for our next campsite. This hike had a lot more elevation, but we found strength in numbers and crushed the hike. When we got to our campsite it started to rain quite hard, so we set up our tents quickly. Unfortunately, within 20 minutes of steady rain it became clear that our campsite was compromised due to flooding. The slick rock makes for a lot of waterfalls. We worked as a team to get all of our tents back over the raging river that was a stream just minutes ago, and soon enough were all safely relocated on higher ground. Fortunately, this was the time when the rain stopped, so we were able to hang our wet socks out to dry. spent the rest of the day exploring the land without packs and at night we heard Colton share his experience, strength, and hope with the group.
We woke with the sunrise on the third day and made our way to the Escalante River to locate the ammo cans we had dropped previously so we could refill our food bags. I was impressed with our leader Aaron’s ability to navigate through the often-steep terrain without a trail, safely getting us down the river. Once we got our food bags replenished we made our way to our next campsite, a huge cove with ancient artifacts. We cooked some delicious dehydrated meals and meditated under the full moon.
The next day we packed up and started our way back to Death Hollow, the last mile involved hiking upstream in knee deep water. We found another cove campsite just beside the river. After setting up camp Mike lead Tre and I upstream a bit further to a swimming hole with a waterfall that we stood under. The water was cold, but very refreshing. And good for our sore muscles. We all slept without tents that night telling some ghost stories and enjoying each other’s company.
The next morning, we treaded back to Sand Creek, where we saw some ancient pottery and artifacts from the Anastasi tribe. From there we trekked on to Death Hollow where we spent our last night cooking chili and playing hacky-sack. This was the coldest night (all our sleeping bags were iced over) but we all woke up positive and friendly and listened to music while we waited for our packs to thaw out. From there Aaron lead us to the van. Next stop was Big Al’s burgers and then one more night camping at Badger Overpass. Great trip!
Client Journal by Liam